The Father of Her Child
by Pickleweasel1208
Summary: Sasuke happens upon a captured kunoichi and saves her life. The ramifications of this action are unexpected to both of them.


She didn't know what to call him. Her savior, her companion, her friend, her lover – none of those seemed to fit. There was only one thing he was to her that she knew for certain.

The father of her child.

He had happened upon her in the woods, while her captors slept. She was so drained of chakra at that point that they hadn't even bothered to set up a watch rotation to worry about her escaping. He could have carried her out, chakra restraints and all, and unbound her feet and wrists when they were a safe distance away.

Instead, he purposely woke her captors, interrogated them, and killed them.

She was grateful to be rescued, but her first worry was that her savior would be no less cruel than the men who had kidnapped her. Killing the men who had been draining her chakra was the only way to keep her from becoming a liability to him. They would have hunted her down otherwise, for a while anyway. Someone like her with such vast chakra reserves was a rare resource, and they would not have parted with her, their personal chakra battery, easily. She understood that. It still bothered her though, the ease with which he had killed them. No hesitation, no mercy, just lightning fast speed and a kunai to the heart for each of them. He hadn't even activated his sharingan.

He wiped his blade clean on the grass before freeing her.

He told her she was too weak to keep moving that night, and that they would stay there until morning. That way he wouldn't have to carry her. He cut her restraints, then tossed her one of her captors' sleeping bags.

They slept amongst the corpses, and she didn't learn his name until the next day.

They ate the dead men's food for breakfast, and took what looked useful from their supplies. Once he was sure she could move quickly enough to keep up with him, they set off in a direction of his choosing. He had asked her where she was from, but showed no intentions of taking her back to her village. It was just part of his fact gathering. For some reason, he thought it better to keep her with him than return her to her village, despite the fact that he would probably be rewarded for bringing her home safely.

She had no idea where they were, so she couldn't just go off on her own. Despite the fact that her chakra reserves were huge compared to his, his ninjutsu and taijutsu were far superior to hers. And he had the sharingan.

So it was safer to stay with him, a potential protector, than to venture off and try to find her way home, from which she had been taken in a blindfolded, drugged state.

He told her just enough about himself so that she knew his mission. Kill his brother and restart his clan. When she asked where his brother was, he just told her they were on his trail. So she followed him, wondering what use she could be to him on his mission, and reminding herself to be grateful to be alive.

It was only a few days before they had sex for the first time. She wasn't foolish enough to call it making love – there was no love between them, only desire and lust. She just didn't know what his desire was for – her, sex, or the thought she did not even let enter her mind – restarting his clan. But that night, and the next, and those that followed, she didn't care. She felt needed, wanted, cherished.

She knew she was pregnant only a few weeks later.

When she rebuffed his advances that night, he asked her what was wrong. Sobbing, she told him, and he held her, stroking her hair as she wet his shirt with her tears.

He told her it would be all right. They would go to a doctor in the next town they reached, have her examined, and get her whatever vitamin supplements she needed. They would go to doctors for checkups as needed so they could make sure she was healthy during her pregnancy.

But what if she didn't want to carry the pregnancy to term? She didn't want to be a mother at seventeen.

When she said this, he pulled back as though she had slapped him in the face. He told her that it was her choice, but she could tell he was hurt and angry. It was only later, when she was less emotional, that she realized what aborting his child would mean to him. Her being pregnant was the symbol of his clan being reborn, and he couldn't let that go.

She was a little over a month along when they first visited a doctor. The doctor pointed on the sonogram to the gestational sac where the embryo was growing – it was just a little dot. But she didn't just see it as that. It was her child. His child. Their child. And she couldn't kill it. She didn't even know if she loved him, but she knew that she wanted to keep his baby.

When she told him she was keeping it, she could almost feel the relief radiating from him.

He bought her the vitamins the doctor recommended, and made a note of the next time they should head into a town for a checkup. He treated her to a nice dinner, and she almost felt as though they were a normal couple. Almost.

She was three months along when they finally found his brother.

He had her wait at their camp, not wanting her to be used against him. He left to pursue his brother at dawn.

It was dusk when he returned, covered in blood.

He sat numbly as she cleaned the dried blood from his face with a damp cloth. None of it was his own. She heard a small sound and looked around quickly before realizing it had come from his throat.

A sob.

Soon, his whole body was shaking with his sobs, and she held him. She didn't know what else to do; he had never been this vulnerable since she had met him. Making soothing noises like one would make to comfort a child, she just held him until he finally went limp in her arms.

They would never speak of that night.

The next day, everything was back to normal. He told her they would be heading back to his village with an appeal to withdraw his status as a missing nin and to allow him to reclaim status as the head of his clan.

Then, looking away, he muttered something about marriage.

To spare him the embarrassment of having to ask, she told him a clan couldn't be just one person, and that she and their child would be part of the clan as well. If, of course, she could go back to her own village, let everyone know she was fine, and invite them to the wedding. She was a bit young to marry, but her parents would accept her decision. She just needed to know that she was not a captive, and that she was actually allowed to see her family and friends.

His reaction was unexpected. He actually apologized. Not for getting her pregnant, not for taking her with him across miles and miles on his quest, but for making her think she would never see her loved ones again.

She accepted his apology with grace, and more than a little relief.

They stopped in the next town to see a doctor. Everything was going well with the pregnancy, and she felt as though her heart had stopped when she saw the sonogram.

Her child actually looked like a baby. Not a dot, but a baby. She cried, filled with emotions she couldn't describe, and he held her hand.

A few days of travel later, he told her they were almost home, and pointed in the direction of his village.

She stood and looked over at Konoha, just visible before the horizon. Was she making the right choice, keeping her baby, and staying with him? Why had he rescued her? Did he love her? Did she love him? Just what was he to her?

In a rare show of tenderness, he embraced her from behind and kissed her neck. He ran a hand gently over her belly, and interlaced his fingers with hers.

He was the father of her child.

And maybe that was enough.


End file.
